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Astro: Is it quiet on here??



 
 
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  #1  
Old February 6th 07, 06:30 PM posted to alt.binaries.pictures.astro
Muttsdanglers
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Posts: 15
Default Astro: Is it quiet on here??

All i can see is 11 messages?? Blueyonder has been having a few server
problems but is them or is it just that everyone is outside snapping the
sky??

Paul


  #2  
Old February 6th 07, 07:33 PM posted to alt.binaries.pictures.astro
Kev
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Posts: 72
Default Astro: Is it quiet on here??

"Muttsdanglers" wrote in message
o.uk...
All i can see is 11 messages?? Blueyonder has been having a few server
problems but is them or is it just that everyone is outside snapping the
sky??


Yes its quiet...
No its because its cold!

Kev


  #3  
Old February 6th 07, 07:35 PM posted to alt.binaries.pictures.astro
Rick Johnson[_2_]
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Posts: 3,085
Default Astro: Is it quiet on here??



Muttsdanglers wrote:
All i can see is 11 messages?? Blueyonder has been having a few server
problems but is them or is it just that everyone is outside snapping the
sky??

Paul


Probably, like me, they are under clouds. Full moon is also a pain and
I haven't been above -18C (0F) for 6 days now. And it is snowing. At
least no Florida twisters.

Rick
--
Correct domain name is arvig and it is net not com. Prefix is correct.
Third character is a zero rather than a capital "Oh".

  #4  
Old February 6th 07, 08:45 PM posted to alt.binaries.pictures.astro
Muttsdanglers
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 15
Default Astro: Is it quiet on here??

-18!!!! where are you????
It goes to -2 here in sussex in the uk and we moan!!!


Paul


"Rick Johnson" wrote in message
...


Muttsdanglers wrote:
All i can see is 11 messages?? Blueyonder has been having a few server
problems but is them or is it just that everyone is outside snapping the
sky??

Paul


Probably, like me, they are under clouds. Full moon is also a pain and I
haven't been above -18C (0F) for 6 days now. And it is snowing. At least
no Florida twisters.

Rick
--
Correct domain name is arvig and it is net not com. Prefix is correct.
Third character is a zero rather than a capital "Oh".



  #5  
Old February 6th 07, 09:28 PM posted to alt.binaries.pictures.astro
Rick Johnson[_2_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 3,085
Default Astro: Is it quiet on here??

Northern Minnesota a few miles SE of the start of the Mississippi at
47N. No sea to keep us warm. Most nights are in the -30C range of late
but its warmer now. Supposed to hit -16C today. Got 3C to go per my
thermometer. -40C isn't uncommon here though not this winter -- so far.
Lowest I've seen has been -36C. Hard to tell the difference. Lowest
I tried to image was about -31C. Camera was drawing only 4% of max for
cooling as it was set at -35C. Mount sometimes stalled when slewed at
30% (slowest it goes) and had to be restarted each move. Needs winter
grease and I didn't do that. Have to go out to restart it. Not fun. A
little push in the direction it is moving gets it going again after
rebooting the mount. Grabbing a solid axis even with gloves at that
temp is a tad cold. Next year I'll relub with winter grease before it
gets too cold. To remove the summer grease it needs to slew at full
speed which it doesn't do when much below 0C.

BTW, -2C isn't uncommon in early June here.

Though when I was over in your country many years ago I found, your -2
feels a lot colder than ours. Something to do with the sea air I
suppose. Temps in that range there caused me to shiver. Here at that
temp I only wear a long sleeve wool shirt at that temperature.

Rick


Muttsdanglers wrote:

-18!!!! where are you????
It goes to -2 here in sussex in the uk and we moan!!!


Paul


"Rick Johnson" wrote in message
...


Muttsdanglers wrote:

All i can see is 11 messages?? Blueyonder has been having a few server
problems but is them or is it just that everyone is outside snapping the
sky??

Paul


Probably, like me, they are under clouds. Full moon is also a pain and I
haven't been above -18C (0F) for 6 days now. And it is snowing. At least
no Florida twisters.

Rick
--
Correct domain name is arvig and it is net not com. Prefix is correct.
Third character is a zero rather than a capital "Oh".


  #6  
Old February 8th 07, 08:42 PM posted to alt.binaries.pictures.astro
Peter Hucker[_1_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 179
Default Astro: Is it quiet on here??

I don't understand the obsession with temperature people have. Sure,
it's annoying having to scrape the car windscreen, but that's it.

On Tue, 06 Feb 2007 19:45:06 GMT, "Muttsdanglers"
wrote:

-18!!!! where are you????
It goes to -2 here in sussex in the uk and we moan!!!


Paul


"Rick Johnson" wrote in message
.. .


Muttsdanglers wrote:
All i can see is 11 messages?? Blueyonder has been having a few server
problems but is them or is it just that everyone is outside snapping the
sky??

Paul


Probably, like me, they are under clouds. Full moon is also a pain and I
haven't been above -18C (0F) for 6 days now. And it is snowing. At least
no Florida twisters.

Rick
--
Correct domain name is arvig and it is net not com. Prefix is correct.
Third character is a zero rather than a capital "Oh".


--
http://www.petersparrots.com http://www.insanevideoclips.com http://www.petersphotos.com

Fellows, it's often easier to just give in to your wife. I mean, what's your word against thousands of hers?
  #7  
Old February 9th 07, 02:44 AM posted to alt.binaries.pictures.astro
George Normandin[_1_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,022
Default Astro: Is it quiet on here??

"Peter Hucker" wrote
....
I don't understand the obsession with temperature people have. Sure,
it's annoying having to scrape the car windscreen, but that's it.


Peter, et al:

As Rick pointed out really cold temps may have negative impacts on astro
gear. Although I've not had problems with the OGS 100 mount or my MI-250
mount, I'm reluctant to run someone else's mount at -30C. Also, it is often
difficult to get the PCs to boot after they've sat around in temps like that
for weeks. There's a guy who posts here sometimes who is an emergency room
MD and he has advised me on the dangers of exposure at -30C - like death in
30 to 60 minutes. I usually image on a remote mountain top surrounded by
wildlife (coyotes killed a horse about a mile away last year) and I'm always
concerned with falling down the stairs or just getting hit by the scope or
losing the car or building key in the snow or getting the observatory door
jammed closed. It's a long three mile walk down a dark mountain road......
and there's no cell phone service. Last night a friend and I decided that
with a wind-chill of -21 C we would not go up on the hill to observe Saturn
(although he really wanted to). I'll wait for warmer nights.

Last Saturday I did some solar observing with my PST at a -30C wind chill.
In my full gear I was warm enough but the wind keep blowing snow into my
eyes and they were watering so badly that I had a hard time seeing. After
about 20 minutes I gave up.

BTW, Not much snow where I live in south central NY, but to get to my
Adirondack camp I'd have to drive thru 6 foot deep snow (another foot
forecast for tonight). I'd have to observe from a hole!!

George N



  #8  
Old February 9th 07, 03:50 AM posted to alt.binaries.pictures.astro
Rick Johnson[_2_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 3,085
Default Astro: Is it quiet on here??

Obviously you haven't used a snow blower to clear a km of road at -36C
I did that last year. 20cm of snow, 8 foot wide road for a km at -36C
is NOT just scraping a windshield. That's no problem at all but have
you stood out at those temps in a 20 km wind guiding an exposure for 1.5
hours. I did that in my film days. That's NOT just scraping a
windshield. When the temp is -35C here the wind chill is more like
-50C. Unexposed skin freezes solid in seconds in those conditions.

Also seeing is awful, least it has been this cold snap.

I had 6" seeing last night 5" tonight. Forget imaging due to seeing alone.

Rick


Peter Hucker wrote:
I don't understand the obsession with temperature people have. Sure,
it's annoying having to scrape the car windscreen, but that's it.

On Tue, 06 Feb 2007 19:45:06 GMT, "Muttsdanglers"
wrote:


-18!!!! where are you????
It goes to -2 here in sussex in the uk and we moan!!!


Paul


"Rick Johnson" wrote in message
. ..


Muttsdanglers wrote:

All i can see is 11 messages?? Blueyonder has been having a few server
problems but is them or is it just that everyone is outside snapping the
sky??

Paul

Probably, like me, they are under clouds. Full moon is also a pain and I
haven't been above -18C (0F) for 6 days now. And it is snowing. At least
no Florida twisters.

Rick
--
Correct domain name is arvig and it is net not com. Prefix is correct.
Third character is a zero rather than a capital "Oh".



--
Correct domain name is arvig and it is net not com. Prefix is correct.
Third character is a zero rather than a capital "Oh".

  #9  
Old February 9th 07, 04:04 AM posted to alt.binaries.pictures.astro
Rick Johnson[_2_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 3,085
Default Astro: Is it quiet on here??



George Normandin wrote:

"Peter Hucker" wrote
...

I don't understand the obsession with temperature people have. Sure,
it's annoying having to scrape the car windscreen, but that's it.



Peter, et al:

As Rick pointed out really cold temps may have negative impacts on astro
gear. Although I've not had problems with the OGS 100 mount or my MI-250
mount, I'm reluctant to run someone else's mount at -30C. Also, it is often
difficult to get the PCs to boot after they've sat around in temps like that
for weeks. There's a guy who posts here sometimes who is an emergency room
MD and he has advised me on the dangers of exposure at -30C - like death in
30 to 60 minutes. I usually image on a remote mountain top surrounded by
wildlife (coyotes killed a horse about a mile away last year) and I'm always
concerned with falling down the stairs or just getting hit by the scope or
losing the car or building key in the snow or getting the observatory door
jammed closed. It's a long three mile walk down a dark mountain road......
and there's no cell phone service. Last night a friend and I decided that
with a wind-chill of -21 C we would not go up on the hill to observe Saturn
(although he really wanted to). I'll wait for warmer nights.


Last Saturday I did some solar observing with my PST at a -30C wind chill.
In my full gear I was warm enough but the wind keep blowing snow into my
eyes and they were watering so badly that I had a hard time seeing. After
about 20 minutes I gave up.

BTW, Not much snow where I live in south central NY, but to get to my
Adirondack camp I'd have to drive thru 6 foot deep snow (another foot
forecast for tonight). I'd have to observe from a hole!!

George N




I ran a bit of new warm weather grease as you can't mix the two on the
worms (both axes) and now I'm slewing at -35C at 50% speed without a
problem. Paramount recommends no more than that at these temps so
haven't even tried setting it faster. Before regreasing only slews were
a problem. It guided and tracked just fine. I could slew with the hand
control fine as well but the higher speed computer slew was too much and
it would shut down. I dab of fresh grease seems to have done the trick.

But I do have a problem with the FRONT of the CCD window frosting over.
Have to hit the camera for 5 minutes with a hair dryer and that clears
the frost. Then running the cooler without the fan keeps enough heat in
the camera to keep it frost free for the night. But all that is moot
with the horrid seeing I have right now. Hard focusing on a star that's
doing the Cha-Cha-Cha and Jitterbug at the same time.

No snow here either. We have had so little grass fires have been a
problem! Only had to blow the road 4 times this year and only once at
below zero (-18C) temp. Much better than last year when I was doing it
two and three times a week with drifts a meter high each time. But we
need the moisture. We were short over 10" of rain this summer and over
40" of snow short so far this winter. Not good. I wonder how Peter
would like a frozen septic system. With no snow cover that's been a big
problem up here. I put in a fully insulated system with 6" of foam
around the tank and pipes. The drain field has two feet of grasses over
it so is well insulated even without the snow. What snow we do have I
blow over the field from the drive and parking area. That put about a
foot of it on top of the grass. So we have no problem but many are in
deep .... in more ways than one.

Rick

  #10  
Old February 9th 07, 07:29 PM posted to alt.binaries.pictures.astro
Peter Hucker[_1_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 179
Default Astro: Is it quiet on here??

Sounds fun to me, apart from the lower quality results of course.

On Thu, 08 Feb 2007 20:50:15 -0600, Rick Johnson
wrote:

Obviously you haven't used a snow blower to clear a km of road at -36C
I did that last year. 20cm of snow, 8 foot wide road for a km at -36C
is NOT just scraping a windshield. That's no problem at all but have
you stood out at those temps in a 20 km wind guiding an exposure for 1.5
hours. I did that in my film days. That's NOT just scraping a
windshield. When the temp is -35C here the wind chill is more like
-50C. Unexposed skin freezes solid in seconds in those conditions.

Also seeing is awful, least it has been this cold snap.

I had 6" seeing last night 5" tonight. Forget imaging due to seeing alone.

Rick


Peter Hucker wrote:
I don't understand the obsession with temperature people have. Sure,
it's annoying having to scrape the car windscreen, but that's it.

On Tue, 06 Feb 2007 19:45:06 GMT, "Muttsdanglers"
wrote:


-18!!!! where are you????
It goes to -2 here in sussex in the uk and we moan!!!


Paul


"Rick Johnson" wrote in message
...


Muttsdanglers wrote:

All i can see is 11 messages?? Blueyonder has been having a few server
problems but is them or is it just that everyone is outside snapping the
sky??

Paul

Probably, like me, they are under clouds. Full moon is also a pain and I
haven't been above -18C (0F) for 6 days now. And it is snowing. At least
no Florida twisters.

Rick
--
Correct domain name is arvig and it is net not com. Prefix is correct.
Third character is a zero rather than a capital "Oh".


--
http://www.petersparrots.com http://www.insanevideoclips.com http://www.petersphotos.com

There are two sides to every divorce:
Yours and the stupid idiot's.
 




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